It's all very well going agricultural with the goys, but you need to be in the, like, whole of your health in the morning when the lady professes her love, writes writes Ross O'Carroll-Kelly
It has to be said - I'm incredible in bed. Honestly, I could sleep for three days if I was let. Especially after a night in Coppers.
One night a year, me and the goys decide to go agricultural and last night was it. There is nothing in the world more disgusting than birds in their county acrylics - except obviously the Dame Judi Dench bath scene in Notes from a Scandal - but when you're too mullered to chat up anything in Krystle, it's reassuring to know that you can still pick up a bargain a couple of doors down in what we call the Heatons of love.
I put a heroic amount of spadework into a bird who, to be fair to her, wasn't that unlike Katherine Heigl. Did my usual routine - moseyed over, read what it said on her sleeve and went, "Corcaigh? Which one is that then? I know it's not Mayo because Mayo is, like, Maigh Eo or some shit." Turned out she was from, like, Cork - or as it's more commonly pronounced, "Cork, boy" - and the amazing thing was, she was actually proud of it. All night she banged on about it, though it was when she said the words, "You can't spell success without UCC," that I decided to bail.
I hit the TK Maxx and climbed out the window. The bouncers have actually put a stepladder in there for me.
All of this is, like, by the by. The point is that I'm in the sack the following morning when all of a sudden Sorcha rings, sounding big-time upset, and she says she's, like, outside.
She looks incredible, it has to be said, in this, like, powder blue fitted dress, which I presume is the Roberto Cavalli one that showed up on my credit cord statement a couple of weeks ago, with a navy blue cordigan over it.
She seems, like, on the point of tears. And because I've seen this actual picture numerous times before, I presume it's something I've done.
"I need you to do something for me," she goes, twirling her cor keys in her hand, nervously, if that's the word.
I'm like, "What?" And she's there, "Come with me to the hospital." Of course my first instinct is, Oh my God, after last night, if I never see another nurse again . . .
But then she hits me with it. "Ross, I found a lump," she goes. And the whole focking world stops.
I don't say anything. I don't even move. She takes my hand and presses it against what I think is called her sternum. There's a lump there, small and hard and, like, perfectly round.
"Does it hurt?" I go.
She's like, "No but they're the ones you so need to get checked out?"
I'm like, "I wouldn't worry - it's probably, like, hormless. It might be, I don't know . . ." and before I can, like, think of something to say, she goes, "Will you come with me? I don't want to go on my own."
So 10 seconds later, roysh, we're in her Mini Cooper, heading for the Beacon. There's something I need to know, even though it's really, like, petty to bring it up and shit? "Where's Cillian?" I go.
She's like, "He's in London. A company law seminar about process improvement methodologies," and the reason I don't say the words "What a tosspot" is because she's pretty much said them for me.
We sit in the waiting room. Our nerves must be, like, shot to pieces because the conversation just, like, slips and slides all over the place.
"How's Ronan?" she goes. "Is he still - what does he call it? - keeping his nose clean?" I'm like, "Yeah. I kind of miss him walking into a room and checking all the windows for snipers. Said he couldn't have lived that way for ever, though. I'd have ended up brown bread - or worse, in the big house in a back-to-front jacket."
She cracks up laughing at that. She loves my impressions of Ro, in fairness to her.
"I've never given you enough credit for being a good father," she goes, totally out of the blue.
I've got Honor in my orms and she's, like, fast asleep. "If this is, you know, serious, I know you'll do a great job bringing her up . . ."
"Don't even talk like that," I go. "Sorcha, I couldn't even think of, like, the world without you in it." She turns and looks at me, full-on. She goes, "Are you serious?" And I'm there, "Of course . . . I still love you, you know?" She thinks about this for a second, then nods really slowly and goes, "Well, I'm still in love with you, Ross . . . probably always will be," and then, as if suddenly remembering herself, goes, "Cillian's learning the Spanish guitar. He can play, like, José González and everything . . ."
Her name is called and I go to stand up but she says she wants to go in on her own and asks me to wait outside with Honor, which I do, just sitting there, watching her sleep, thinking about what's just been said and what's being said behind that door. And if anything ever happened to Sorcha, I'd . . .
The door suddenly opens and she flies through it, past me and down the corridor, with her hand over her mouth. I'm like, "Sorcha - what's the story?" and I look at the doctor and he shakes his head and goes, "She needs to tell you herself." I jump up, with Honor still in my orms, and chase after her, but by the time I catch up with her, she's already in the cor with the engine running. I hop in.
"Whatever it is," I go, "we'll face it. Me and you - together, the way it's supposed to be." I put my hand on her hand but she sort of, like, swats it away, puts the cor into gear and tears off at, like, a hundred Ks an hour.
"There's all sorts of treatment," I'm going. "Whatever it is, I'm sure it's not, like, a death sentence . . ." Without indicating, she suddenly pulls in. This is on, like, the M50.
I'm like, "We can go to, like, the States..." "Shut up!" she's suddenly going. "Shut! Up!" and she's quiet for, like, a minute, maybe two, then she goes, "Ross, I left the security tag on my dress."
I'm like, "The Roberto Cavalli one?" but she doesn't answer. I go, "Well, you did the right thing getting it checked out, though."
She just bursts into tears. Relief, happiness, embarrassment - I don't know.
Hard to know anything after a morning like this.
TXT ROSS
Some dude called Serms goes, "Unlik ur texter last week I fail to see the funny side of the missing L from the words public bar on the mont clare. On a recent stag party a gang of 20 of us staggered in there at 2 o'c in the aftern expectin to find all kinds of debauchery goin on. Imagine our disappointment to discover nothing but obese Americans eatin irish stew n askin the lounge staff in v loud voices if Oscar Wilde ever drank in here."
Yes, they should prosecute them under the Trade Descriptions Act.
Donal D goes, "Yo rossmeister, any thoughts on the new starbucks in the coombe?"
Just that children are going to be taken from the breast straight on to chai lattes with soya milk if this keeps up.
Readers in need of advice can text Ross at 087-9773781
Discover Ross's world by visiting www.rossocarrollkelly.ie